Kingdoms of the Lost
Kingdoms of the Lost is a MUD (WP), a text-based online role-playing game (WP). It was founded by Nick Herber and Heather Tompkins in August 2000. Theme Kingdoms of the Lost is a swords and sorcery fantasy game set in the original world of Volain. It was initially founded with five central kingdoms: Armengar, Calararian, Klevnone, Mesilena and Murkwood. These five lands were established as the primary hubs for player activity and focused on a theme of kingdom relationsions, though religious wars also were a factor. Gameplay The game initiates with a detailed character creation process. Once the character has been completed, players are navigated through a somewhat extensive school to teach the basics of MUDs as well as the particulars of Kingdoms of the Lost. Each of the kingdoms serves as a central location for role-playing, questing and safety, though they can come under attack via restricted player vs player combat during times of war. However, the bulk of the gaming experience comes from trekking out away from the city and into the more than 150 unique zones that are filled with NPCs that can serve as opponents for earning experience, gold and items or sometimes as quest givers or shop owners that can assist the player with the progression process. Progression occurs in multiple ways. Experience can be earned towards gaining levels (there is a branching Tier system that offers the players five basic classes to start but eventually evolve into one of 75 total classes. The level system caps out at 275. There are other elements of progression as well, from races that can acquire increased statistics and eventually evolve into more powerful races, skills that have to be used to perfect (eventually reaching a Grandmaster status) and more. Role-playing is encouraged through a system that automatically rewards players with RPXP (role-playing experience) based on interactions with one another. This RPXP can be spent on a variety of different things in-game. History Kingdoms of the Lost was founded in August of 2000 when the two immortals of Realm of the Crystal Dragon (RCD) had a vision for a new game with some similarities to RCD, but with some radically different directions they wanted to take the mechanics. They based the game on an old Dungeons & Dragons campaign of Nick's from years prior. Early focus was on establishing a Tier system for classes, Evolution system for races, a Custom Equipment system to make use of auto questing and an emphasis on rewardng players who wanted to write stories and role-play. Initially Kingdoms of the Lost was focused on five main kingdoms, each of which was run by players. Eventually a leaderless, lawless land named Tozain was added as an option for players. Additional kingdoms were added several years later when player numbers swelled and new options were requested. These kingdoms were called Tozain and Lapis, but after a temporary shutdown of the MUD allowed the staff to rebuild several aspects of the game from the ground up, the number of players saw a decline. As a result Tozain and Lapis were reduced to non-player cities that could be visited, but no longer served as player-run cities. Armengar was later removed as a player-run city as well, with a storyline that saw it overrun with undead. Technical Infrastructure Kingdoms of the Lost is based on the ROM |(WP) codebase, part of the DikuMUD (WP) family. It consists of over 170 original areas comprising over 10,000 characters and rooms. References The Mud Connector Top MUD Sites External Links Official Website Kingdoms of the Lost can be connected to at kotl.org 2222 64.49.223.8